October 2, 2020

Dear John,

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit North Texas hard, and I’ve heard from so many on how this crisis has affected them. Over four months ago, I voted to pass the original Heroes Act to provide relief to North Texans dealing with the impact of this pandemic. As negotiations continue, the House has passed an updated Heroes Act to deliver necessary relief to support our small businesses, help our airline workers, expand unemployment benefits and dramatically ramp up testing.

The measure includes funding to ramp up testing, tracing, and treatment of COVID-19, provides support to our state and local governments to pay vital workers like our first responders and health care professionals, restores unemployment benefits with an additional $600 federal benefit, and provides a second round of stimulus payments to individuals. 

In addition to these provisions and additional measures to help restaurants, venues, small businesses and airline workers, the updated Heroes Act includes my bill, the Aid and Attendance Support Act. This measure will increase by 25% the amount paid to disabled veterans to assist with their daily activities to help cover new COVID-19 related expenses for 60 days, including purchasing personal protective equipment for veterans and their caregivers.

North Texans need Congress to deliver economic relief, and support our local governments and public health systems -- and I’ve been working every day to do just that. I urge Congressional leaders and this Administration to stay at the table until they reach a bipartisan deal that can be signed into law.

For coronavirus information and resources on federal assistance as it relates to the pandemic, please visit allred.house.gov/coronavirus or give my Richardson office a call at (972) 972-7949 with any questions.

Sincerely,

Colin Allred
Member of Congress